Rick Perry Has Hit The Panic Button

As his once-soaring campaign enters a second month of political
freefall, Rick Perry is pulling out all the
stops to resuscitate his White House bid.

On the eve of Perry's major flat tax policy rollout and a
multimillion ad launch in Iowa, the Texas Governor's presidential
campaign has announced that it is adding some national political
muscle to what has so far been a
tight-knit, Texas-centric operation.

Headlining the new hires is Bush campaign veteran Joe
Allbaugh, a big-name GOP operative who will work with
Perry's chief strategist Dave Carney as a senior advisor.
Allbaugh will be joined on the strategy side by California-based
political consultant Fred Maas and Tony
Fabrizio, a leading Republican pollster who has been
advising Florida Gov. Rick Scott.

Perry also tapped into Scott's team on the media side by hiring
Curt Anderson and Nelson
Warville, two big-name media consultants who, along with
Fabrizio, were key to Scott's unlikely — and expensive 2010 win.
Their new presence in the Perry camp indicates that the Texans
are looking to run a similar big-spending, upstart campaign.

Rounding out the new hires are top political ad man Jim
Innocenzi and Stanton Anderson, a
senior counsel to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce who will be the
campaign's point man on Capitol Hill.

Although sources on the campaign insist that Carney, Perry's
longtime right-hand man, will still be calling the shots, they
concede that the additions will bring some much-needed experience
to a team that has been overwhelmed by the demands of a
presidential campaign.

And Texas
Monthly's Paul Burka reports that the new hires — and
Allbaugh in particular — indicate that Carney is out of his
element, and will take a backseat as the national talent takes
over.

According to Burka, a well-sourced Texas journalist, the
candidate's wife, Anita Perry, was the driving
force behind the shakeup.